Backwards Traveller
by Lydia Hunter
Summary: The Doctor runs across an old companion who prefers to keep his past where it belongs.


BACKWARDS TRAVELLER

Barnes and Noble, New York City, July 1997

"This'll be a great present for my mom's birthday," Peri enthused. "A new Danielle Steele that hasn't been published yet. And the best part, Dr. 'I don't obey any of the rules of the Time Lords, but I expect everybody else to' is that I can give it to her in 1984 and she'll never even think about looking at the date."

The Doctor looked at the thick novel with obvious disapproval. "Yes, that sounds par for the course for fans of the genre," he noted sarcastically.

Peri paid no attention as she browsed the shelves of paperbacks, filling her arms to capacity. "And _these _are for me," she announced, drooling over several years of future Stephen King novels. Here, hold 'em, will you? You know, the only bad thing about this future shopping stuff is the way the prices have gone up. Geez! $6.99 for a paperback? Course, I suppose we could travel ahead half a dozen more years and then I could pick them all up half price at a used book store," she laughed.

Two of the books fell from the Doctor's hands as yet another several people pushed past him, turning to stare at his wildly coloured outfit. The Time Lord scowled in annoyance. "Why such a crowd in a book store? I didn't think there were this many humans on the planet who could actually read more than a Keep Left sign."

"Keep right," Peri reminded him. "We're in my neck of the woods now, remember?" Ignoring his faint growl, she explained, "There's some famous sci-fi author having a book-signing today, that's why the crowd. Some English guy, Ian something. I read one of his books in high school, I think. All about a group of people in some rickety old time machine that never can get them where they're going; I'd probably relate a little better now!" She pushed her way through the crowd to the centre aisle, the Doctor following with his armload of Peri's books.

A few feet away a woman moved aside to reveal the sign announcing the book signing. "Oh, yeah," Peri said. "That's his name. Chesterton. Ian Chesterton."

The Doctor seemed stunned. "Chesterton? Chesterton!" With his usual unerring instinct (at least it tended to be unerring when it came to matters that weren't about to get them killed) he rushed off to the science-fiction section.

"You've heard of him, then?" Peri panted when she finally caught up with him. She'd had to stop several times on the way to retrieve her precious Stephen Kings from underneath the feet of other customers where the Doctor had dropped them in his flight, but it didn't seem worth arguing about.

He was flipping rapidly through one volume after another of the famed "Traveller's Saga", at a rate that made his claim of speed-reading seem like nonsense. However, he had certainly taken in enough to make him furious. "Heard of him? Oh, yes, I've certainly heard of 'Chatterton'. Two years he was a guest in my TARDIS, and this is how he repays my hospitality? Writing down all our adventures in the guise of vulgar fiction, and portraying me as a crotchety old man bumbling about the universe - old indeed, I wasn't even five hundred yet! And he calls this old fool "the Professor". Why, I'd never allow anyone to call me Professor; I'd sooner be stricken deaf.

"And this! Look at this, Peri, look at this, I tell you!" he ranted, shaking the first book of the series in her face. "That's not even the way it happened. The handsome young hero comes across a car accident on Barnes common and rescues the damsel in distress before being hi-jacked by this "Professor" and taken off to meet pitiful imitations of Daleks. I know what really happened, my girl."

Peri tried not to smile. His anger was, as usual, already starting to burn itself out a bit. "Well, writers are supposed to use their imaginations."

"Chesterton never had an imagination to use."

"So how'd you really meet him?"

"He and Barbara were teachers, and like infernal busybodies they followed my granddaughter home from school one day and straight into the TARDIS."

Something struck a chord and Peri flipped back to the dedication page she'd just looked at. "Barbara was his girlfriend?"

"Not that I know of," the Doctor huffed, heading into his (feigned) air of profound disinterest.

"Hmm. Well, this dedication says, 'To my wife Barbara and our daughters Susan and Vicki. Neverending support, throughout time and space."

A strange, far away look came into the Time Lord's blue eyes. "They named their daughter after Susan? And Vicki, too, of course," he said softly. "Well, well. Imagine that."

* * *

"Mr. Chesterton?" 

Ian sighed wearily. It had been a long day dealing with these Americans, and he had a plane to catch. But he pasted a smile on his face and turned to the dark-haired newcomer. "Yes?"

"Hi, I'm Peri Brown. Sorry to bother you, but a mutual friend of ours sent me to say hello."

"Mutual friend? And who might that be?"

"The Doctor." Something in the way she said it grabbed his attention. Peri gave him a mischievous grin and nodded slightly. "Yeah. Him. Anyway, he said to give his love to Barbara, and uh..." she trailed off.

"She won't believe it."

"I wouldn't. Look, I know you don't know me from Adam, and famous authors probably have a really good reason for not going off with total strangers, especially right in the middle of New York, but won't you come and see him, just for a minute? He wouldn't say anything about wanting to see you, but he's just spent the last two hours telling me stories about the adventures you had - "

"Correcting my version?"

Peri rolled her eyes. "Well, he had a few choice words to say on the subject of Barnes Common, but he settled down after a bit."

Ian laughed. "Sounds as if he hasn't changed at all."

"Uhhh, well, actually, I guess you could say he's changed a lot, in certain ways. But I'm sure he'd love to see you."

Ian checked his watch. "Actually, I'm afraid I have a plane to catch in about three hours, but perhaps I could spare a minute. Against my better judgment," he added to himself.

Peri heard the sotto voce comment and grinned. "The TARDIS is parked next to the antique store round the corner." She gestured and Ian followed her lead, shaking his head as if he couldn't believe his own stupidity.

* * *

The sight of the TARDIS, still in its old familiar blue police box form, shook him badly, and he stopped, staring, for a minute. _Chesterton, old man, what are you doing? _he asked himself. Then he moved on and followed the American girl through the door.

"My God," he breathed, looking around the console room. "It hasn't changed at all."

"Hasn't changed?" demanded an unfamiliar voice from the interior doorway. "Changed? My dear Chesterton, don't you realise that's an entirely new console? I've made so many improvements since your day you shouldn't even recognise the place. I almost didn't myself when I walked in and saw the changes I'd made." Peri rolled her eyes.

Ian turned, somehow still expecting to see his old friend just the way he remembered him, and reeled back against the console when he saw the strange apparition in front of him. A tall, heavy-set man with sandy curls and the most appalling multi-coloured suit was standing there in place of the white-haired old Victorian gentleman he had known so well.

"You're not … but he's not …" He turned to Peri unbelievingly.

"Not the Doctor?" suggested the new voice sarcastically. "Oh, yes, I could have predicted you'd say that. It's just like you, if I remember correctly. And to judge by some of your so-called fiction, my memory is rather better than yours." The strange man moved to the console and turned his back on them as his fingers tapped out a series of commands on a keyboard.

Ian Chesterton cursed himself for having blindly followed the girl into this situation. He'd lost his instinct for danger, that was it. Over thirty years of relative safety and sanity, and he'd forgotten everything he ever knew about how to look out for his own skin. A total stranger had merely said the magic words "Doctor" and "TARDIS" instead of his own fictitious versions, and he'd assumed everything was on the up and up. In New York, yet!

"Look, what _is_ this?" he demanded angrily. "Some sort of elaborate fan thing? I've heard of this kind of obsessive behaviour, but I didn't think my books were popular enough to engender it. You're not the Doctor, so would you mind telling me who the hell you are and precisely what you think you're doing? Kidnapping is against the law in every civilised country on Earth, and – oh, my God! What are you doing?"

The clear column in the centre of the console, the thing he'd long ago been told was properly called a time rotor, began to move up and down. Ian moved slowly backwards until his back was against the cool white wall, his eyes full of anger and fear. His hands felt the once well known shape of the roundels cut into the surface, and he found himself in the grip of a horrifyingly convincing kind of déjà vu.

"Where are you taking me?" he asked, voice breaking with the strain.

"You'll see," came the smug answer.

Peri looked nervously from one to the other. "Doctor … where are we…?"

Her companion shot her one of his looks of irritation. "You'll see," he repeated firmly.

"I'm sorry about all this, Mr. Chesterton," she said, turning to Ian. "I didn't know he was going to try anything like this."

Ian remained silent and white-faced. The shattered expression on his face worried Peri, and she reached for his wrist, feeling the pulse point with concern. After all, he wasn't precisely a young man. His pulse felt steady and strong beneath her fingers, and he gave her a rather sickly smile, as if trying to reassure _her_ about the whole ordeal.

The TARDIS shuddered to a stop with the same distinctive noise that Ian had never quite forgotten, and never entirely managed to describe to his satisfaction. "We've materialised," he said, half to himself. "Somewhere."

The Doctor ... the new Doctor ... this stranger who somehow _was _the Doctor, gazed across the room at him smugly, with an expression Ian could clearly associate with the old man he had known. This was the Doctor's "prepare to tell me what a genius I am" look.

"76 Totter's Lane, London. 1963. Exactly the place you always wanted me to take you."

"Bit late for that now, isn't it?" Ian said carefully. His old friend had always had a volatile temper at times, and this new chap seemed much the same in that area, to judge from the sudden scowl. He even thought he could detect an undercurrent of danger in this Doctor. But still, it had to be said. "I mean, my life, my family, is in 1997."

The Doctor let out a long, irritated sigh. "You're all the same," he said, ostensibly to Peri. "You humans. Travel round with me, whole of space and tie at your feet, and spend the entire journey prattling on about how there's only one place and one time you want to arrive. 'Please, Doctor, can't we get back to 1963?' 'Doctor, what about Heathrow, 1981?' And then when I get you there – wouldn't you know, it isn't where you want to be after all!"

With that, he pulled a lever on the console and strode outside. Exchanging a glance of trepidation, the others followed.

"Oh, my God." Ian gazed round in amazement. "I can't believe it."

"Believe it, my dear Chesterton, believe it," said the Doctor, raising his face to the chill air. "Winter now, I'd say early December. A few weeks after we left. Much safer that way, you understand. Wouldn't want to run into ourselves."

"Are you sure this is 1963?" Ian couldn't help asking. "It doesn't look quite—"

The Doctor interrupted him. "Oh, yes, and I suppose you have total recall of the layout of a scrapyard you saw only once, after dark? Decades ago? How impressive – particularly for a man who can't even decide if he made my acquaintance here or following a car crash on Barnes Common."

Ian flushed. "I had to fictionalise some of the details, because if – no, I'm not letting you sidetrack me, Doctor. I don't remember all the surroundings the night we met, but I do know that car body over there looks a lot closer to 1973 than 1963. Either way, unless it's 1997, _I don't belong."_ He opened the door of the police box and stomped back inside.

Peri could see him through the open doorway, hands flat on the console, head hanging down in despair. She felt terribly sorry for the elderly man. "Can't you get him home, Doctor?" she asked her companion quietly. "Or at least back to New York or something."

"Oh, of course I can, Peri. That isn't the point. This place," he said, jabbing one finger toward the entrance of the yard, "this place was a sticking point. I wanted Chesterton to see I was perfectly capable of returning, given time."

He didn't say anything else for a few minutes, busying himself rooting through piles of junk with a somewhat proprietary air. At length he said, more to a broken cabinet than to her, "Amazing how men are compelled to repeat the same mistakes. Never fails to astound me, after all these centuries. I took Ian and Barbara against their wills because they irritated me so terribly. And now here's Ian again, irritating me in just the same way, and my reaction is precisely the same. Taking him away from his home simply as a gesture against that revolting smugness."

Peri was touched. "I'm sure if you just tell him that, he'll accept your apology without any hard feelings. And you'll get him back to '97 before long, don't worry." She reached out to touch his arm but jumped back when he rounded on her abruptly.

"Worry!" he shouted. "I? Apologise to Chesterton? Whatever in the universe would I have to apologise to _him_ for? Here I've just been telling you how the man seems incapable of learning from his earlier mistakes, and you dare to suggest _I_ should be the one offering apologies? I'm surprised at you, Peri."

"Ah. Sorry. Guess I shoulda known," she answered, trying hard to keep her face straight.

"You should indeed," he responded. "Anyway, I'm going to look about here for a few minutes. Why don't you go and offer our guest a cup of coffee or tea or something of that nature?"

* * *

She found him in the TARDIS kitchens, shaking his head over the food machine. "It has changed, you know. Not just the control room, the corridors and the rooms. I went looking for my old room and ended up here. And I never could get this thing to work properly."

"Oh, don't worry about it," Peri said. "You probably make better coffee than the Doctor."

"I daresay. His tastebuds were never very, er, human."

"N-nooo." She reached into a nearby cupboard and brought out a pair of unmatched plastic mugs. One of them featured the logo of a convenience store in the Tevian galaxy, and the other was emblazoned with the grinning face of an Earth cartoon character from after Peri's time.

"Look, maybe if you give me an address and the exact date you want to be there..."

He gave her a smile of wry amusement. "Do you really think that would help?"

"Couldn't hurt."

Ian took out the notebook he always carried in his jacket pocket, scribbled a few words in it then tore off the page and handed it to Peri.

The two of them sat in silence for several minutes, sipping their coffee, pretending not to worry.

"Why has he changed? Physically, I mean."

"Oh, he just regenerated again. This one's been a little unstable at times."

"Regenerated?" Ian showed the intense interest of his profession. "How do you mean, regenerated?"

"Well," Peri said, "just regenerated. I don't know. It's something Time Lords do, apparently, when something goes wrong with their previous body. Hey, what did yours look like? The way you described him in the books?"

Ian nodded. "Just about. A little old man, about my age now but he looked older – knock wood – with longish white hair and bright, penetrating eyes. He dressed better back then, as well," he added with a laugh. Peri grinned.

"Mine ... the Doctor when I first met him, I mean, was kind of young and blond and good-looking. And he was nicer. A little, I dunno, diffident, maybe, but a nice guy. You have to watch this one a bit."

"Mm. Mine too." Ian took another sip of coffee. " 'Time Lord' – is that what he is? Never heard the expression, but he used to be quite secretive about his past and where he came from. Susan let something slip occasionally."

"That's his – granddaughter? He's never mentioned any family to me, but that's what he said at the bookstore, that you followed her home from school." She seemed a little confused. "_Real_ granddaughter?"

"Oh, yes, I should think so. I vaguely recall some mention of Susan's mother in the past tense; I assumed his daughter had died and he was raising her child."

"Wow," said Peri. "I never thought about the Doctor having a family someplace, but I guess if he's really nine-hundred-and-something years old it's about time he got on with it!" She giggled.

"Nine hundred. I had no idea. So do these Time Lords really have life after life, for hundreds or thousands of years?"

"Apparently."

"And they can grow younger as each life finishes up. What a fascinating concept."

Peri made a sour face. "Yeah, well it's not so great and fascinating to watch happening if you're an outsider. This whole regeneration thing is really traumatic, I can tell you."

Ian smiled at her. "Please do."

* * *

They were still talking twenty minutes later when the Doctor finally made his appearance. _"There_ you both are. I'd made up my mind you were taking an extended tour of the TARDIS interiors."

"You told me to give him coffee," Peri reminded him.

"So I did," he said absently. "Chesterton – Peri insists I owe you an apology."

Ian was considerably surprised. "Oh, that's not necessary, Doctor."

"No, I don't think it is, either. Nevertheless, we must humour her whims. Ian, I'm very sorry you had to be taught a lesson in humility. Arrogance is an unattractive trait at your age. Any time traveller in his right mind would have behaved precisely as I did, but I regret it anyway."

"Apology accepted, Doctor," said Ian, deadpan.

Peri was hiding her face in her hands. Her shoulders shook. "How gracious, Doctor."

"I am always gracious, Peri. Now, Ian, is that your address on that paper? Co-ordinates would be better, you know, but I think I can work with this. We'll have you home in an instant." He strode purposely toward the console room, the note gripped in his hand.

Ian started to follow, then changed his mind and returned to the table. He shoved his empty mug around the table abstractedly. "I wish I could believe that."

Peri shrugged. "Oh, he'll manage. It may take a few tries, but he usually manages to get where he's going."

"He tried for two years to get Barbara and me back home," said Ian flatly. "We'd never have returned to Earth at all if we hadn't stolen a Dalek time machine. At the time we thought that was a terrible prospect, even while we were enjoying our life of adventure. But we were only in our thirties. I'm not, anymore. And this time she's not with me."

She realised now that their nice little gossip over a cup of coffee, all that scientific interest in who the Doctor really was, and how Time Lords managed to regenerate and all that had been just an attempt on his part to keep his mind off the horror of the situation. A faint shudder went through the ship, letting them know they'd taken off again, and a brief glimpse of fear showed in his eyes.

"He'll get you home," Peri declared with as much optimism as she could muster. "After all, it's only been thirty years for you, but for him it's been _centuries._ The Doctor's got loads more experience flying this TARDIS than he did when you knew him." It suddenly occurred to her that just a few minutes ago he'd landed them in the right place and _still_ been a decade off. "I mean, he screws up, sure, but I have yet to see him absolutely, utterly fail."

Ian sighed. "I sincerely hope you're right, Peri. I wish I had your youthful blind faith."

She grinned delightedly. "Blind faith! I'm going to tell him you said that just as soon as you're safely out of here. Unless you want to stick around for the fireworks."

"No, thank you." He got up and headed for the console room, determined to face the worst, then stopped and looked back at her seriously. "Doesn't it ever worry you? The thought that you might never get home, might never see your family again?"

"Hadn't really thought about it. My mom knows I'm travelling, just like any other student, and I'll see her when I see her."

The smile he gave her this time was completely genuine. "I'm glad to have met you," he said sincerely. "Would you mind if I put you in a book sometime?"

* * *

Ian stepped out of the TARDIS warily, gazing at his surroundings with deep suspicion. It was, in fact, the back entry hall of his house in Surrey. The freezer hummed its same familiar, safe tone; the assorted coats and cardigans hanging on hooks across from the door seemed welcoming. A small red and blue jacket belonging to his small grandson had fallen off its peg and draped itself across Barbara's Wellington boots underneath. Everything seemed, at first glance, absolutely right with the world.

He moved into the empty kitchen, checking the clock (half-past two in the afternoon), the calendar (July, 1997, his homecoming date circled in red, with all the previous days carefully X-ed out), and the mini-fridge (bare). That, along with the empty silence of the house, told him his wife was out doing the shopping.

"Well?" demanded the Doctor, coming up behind him.

"I think you managed to come through this time, Doctor. I really do. A few hours early, even."

Peri was investigating the rows of family photos on the side table in the hall. A 35mm camera was lying there among miscellaneous books and papers. She picked it up and aimed it at the two men. "Say cheese!" she commanded. They turned, and she got a candid shot of Ian grinning and the Doctor scowling. "Now Barbara will have to believe you," she said.

"Why don't you both stay until she comes home? Have tea with us. She'd love to see you again, Doctor."

The Doctor considered the proposition for a fraction of a second, then shook his head decisively. "No. I'm sorry to have missed her, but we simply haven't time for tea. We have a universe to save, eh, Peri?"

He took hold of her shoulders and shoved her firmly in the direction of the TARDIS. She handed the camera to Ian as she was bundled past, with a hurried, "I enjoyed meeting you. Glad everything worked out all right!"

A final thought struck Ian just as the TARDIS doors were closing behind them. "Doctor!" he called.

The curly head re-emerged. "Yes?"

"Did you ever go back to see Susan?"

"I've ... seen her a time or two, yes," he equivocated.

"How was she?"

"Older," was the prompt reply. "Goodbye, Chesterton."

"Goodbye, Doctor," Ian said wistfully, and gazed at the camera in his hand. He managed to photograph the TARDIS in the middle of dematerialising, perfectly transparent. The print was to become one of his prize possessions.

When Barbara Chesterton returned home an hour later, she was quite pleased but more than a little surprised to find her husband in his little office, busily typing away on the computer.

"Ian! I didn't expect you until late tonight. Didn't you have one more book signing in New York today?" She gave him a quick kiss of welcome.

"Oh, yes. It was very eventful. I'll tell you all about it over tea, all right?"

"Looks as if you found something to conquer the writer's block," she said, pleased to find him writing for the first time in months.

"Something found me," he answered, still typing. "You remember the complaints about the Traveller's Saga not attracting a young enough demographic anymore, and the Professor being too old...?"

END

**Author's Note:**_ The first three pages of this story have been sitting unfinished and forgotten on a succession of hard drives for six or seven years. My old obsession being revived (and how!) by the new series, I went looking through my Doctor Who folder, found this and wondered, "Now _where_ did I ever intend to go with this concept?" I'm still not sure I had any real idea, other than I wanted Ian Chesterton to have become a science fiction author following his return to Earth, and I wanted the Doctor (and the TARDIS) to finally be able to get him home properly. It was originally titled "Author, Author" but that concentrated on the wrong aspect, so I grabbed the title from an old Wings song. _**LPH, May 2006**


End file.
